Julia Butterfly Hill

Pre–tree sit Hill's father was a traveling minister who went from town to town, bringing his family with him. Until she was about ten years old, Hill lived in a camper with her father Dale, mother Kathy, and brothers Mike and Dan. Julia is the middle child. While traveling with her family, Hill often explored rivers by campgrounds. When Hill was seven years old, she and her family were taking a hike one day when a butterfly landed on her finger and stayed with her for the duration of the hike. From that day on, her nickname became "Butterfly". She decided to use that as her nickname for the rest of her life. At the time, Hill was acting as the designated driver for a friend who had been drinking. Her friend's car was hit from behind by a drunk driver. The steering wheel of the car penetrated her skull. It took almost a year of intensive therapy before she regained the ability to speak and walk normally. She said:

As I recovered, I realized that my whole life had been out of balance... I had graduated high school at 16, and had been working nonstop since then, first as a waitress, then as a restaurant manager. I had been obsessed by my career, success, and material things. The crash woke me up to the importance of the moment, and doing whatever I could to make a positive impact on the future. The steering wheel in my head, both figuratively and literally, steered me in a new direction in my life. which is south of Scotia. On New Year's Eve 1996, a landslide in Stafford caused by clearcut logging by Pacific Lumber Company (Maxxam) on steep slopes above the community resulted in most of the community being buried up to in mud and tree debris; eight homes were completely destroyed. Organizers wanted someone to stay in the tree for one week. "Nobody else would volunteer so they had to pick me", said Hill.

Originally, Hill was not officially affiliated with any environmental organization, deciding by herself to undertake civil disobedience. Soon, she was actively supported by Earth First!, among other organizations, and by volunteers. On December 10, 1997, Hill ascended a 1,000-year-old lightning-struck redwood tree to a height of . The tree had previously been nicknamed “the Stafford Giant" because of its proximity to the small community of Stafford. Since the Moon was rising at the time, activists chose to name the tree “Luna” (Spanish for “Moon”) to commemorate the event:

Farm sale protest In 2006, Hill protested the sale of the South Central Farm in an attempt to save the farm from developers.

Pasadena Unified School District tree sit In June 2026, a group of people occupied trees at John Muir High School to protest the removal of more than 100 trees. 17-year-old Pasadena resident Paloma Muniz-Ochoa tagged Hill in a social media post which inspired Hill to travel to Pasadena and support the tree sitters. The character Sierra Tierwater in the 2000 novel A Friend of the Earth by T. Coraghessan Boyle was partially inspired by Hill. Hill was the subject of the documentary Butterfly (2000) broadcast on PBS POV. She is also featured in the documentary film Tree-Sit: The Art of Resistance. Both films document her time in the redwood tree. In Gilmore Girls Season 3 Episode 8 aired in November 2002, Rory asks Dean if he remembers "that girl Butterfly who lived in a tree for a year", and then continues, "I can officially attest that she was nuts." In 2002 children's book Judy Moody Saves the World, Judy Moody looks up to Hill as an activist. In Penn & Teller's 2003 first season of their documentary television show, Bullshit, Hill appeared as a Special Guest Expert on the episode "Environmental Hysteria". A film adaptation of The Legacy of Luna, to be directed by Laurie Collyer and star Rachel Weisz, became stuck in development hell, although Weisz actively worked towards getting the project off the ground. Hill and the events were featured in the 2010 Michael P. Henning documentary film Hempsters: Plant the Seed. The children's book, Luna and Me: The True Story of a Girl Who Lived in a Tree to Save a Forest, by Jenny Sue Kostecki-Shaw, published in 2015, is a retelling of her time in Luna. The main character of the 2017 Swedish children's book Julia räddar skogen (Julia saves the forest) by Niklas Hill and Anna Palmqvist is named after Hill. The book is about a child who occupies a tree in order to hinder the construction of a new highway. In The Overstory by Richard Powers, the character Olivia Vandergriff is loosely based on Hill.

Music Trey Anastasio and Tom Marshall wrote a song called "Kissed by Mist" about Hill. In 2002, Los Suaves made a song in honor of Hill called "Julia Hill" on the Un paso atrás album in which the singer is "Luna". The Red Hot Chili Peppers 2003 song "Can't Stop" contains the line "J. Butterfly is in the treetop". In 2009, Idina Menzel wrote a song entitled "Butterfly" referring to Hill's concern for the environment. The musical Redwood, inspired by Hill, premiered in 2024 at the La Jolla Playhouse in California and opened on Broadway on February 13, 2025.